


Catching a Smile

by Tenukii



Category: Inside Llewyn Davis (2013), Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015), Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Twins, Alternate Universe - Victorian, Angst with a Happy Ending, Childhood Friends, Christmas, Christmas Party, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, M/M, Misunderstandings, Mutual Pining, Period-Typical Homophobia, but it is NOT a Christmas Carol, but then something happened
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-16
Updated: 2018-02-22
Packaged: 2019-02-15 17:15:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 16,812
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13035753
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tenukii/pseuds/Tenukii
Summary: Ben Solo and his brother Al, sons of one of the most successful merchants in Victorian London, are dismayed when their mother Leia invites the Dameron twins to the family Christmas party.  When they were all children, Poe and Llewyn were Ben and Al's best friends, but now Ben and Llewyn can't forgive, and Poe and Al can't forget.  And then Leia starts making everyone play parlor games...





	1. Chapter 1

“I still don’t understand why we had to invite the Damerons,” Benjamin Solo complained to his mother as she put what she called the “finishing touches” on the enormous Christmas tree in their parlor.  In Ben’s opinion, the Christmas tree had been finished the night before, but Leia had been fiddling with it ever since.  Why stop now, just because it was early afternoon on Christmas Day itself?

“We have been through this, Ben,” Leia replied in a thin, tight voice.  “Those poor boys would be spending Christmas all alone if not for us.  Al, dear, would you come straighten this candleholder up near the top?  I can’t quite reach it.”

“Certainly, Mother!”  Ben’s twin brother, who had been hovering near the sofa where Ben sat sulking, hurried over to do their mother’s bidding cheerfully.  As usual.  Once he had adjusted the candleholder, he looked down at the much shorter Leia and asked, “Is that better?”

“Yes, perfect.  Thank you, darling.”  Leia smiled up at her younger (by two minutes) son.  Al gave her his usual wide, goofy grin in return, then went back over to the sofa and sat down beside his brother.  If Al had hoped to forestall an argument, Ben thought, he was going to have to try harder than being his normal, good-natured self.

Ben said sharply to Leia, who was still fussing over the tree, “How could Poe and Llewyn possibly be spending Christmas alone, when there are two of them?”  Leia sighed, put her hands on her hips, and stood facing the tree for a moment while she gathered her patience; then she moved to sit down in a velvet-covered chair near the sofa.

“You really have your father’s talent for taking my words at their literal meaning,” she said to Ben.  “Of course Poe and Llewyn have each other, but in case you have forgotten, not everyone in London is so blessed as we are.”

Ben muttered under his breath to Al, “How _could_ we forget?  She hasn’t ever given us a chance to.”  Al tried to suppress a chuckle, which Leia gracefully ignored.

She continued, “The Damerons do not have servants like we have, nor do they have any money for decorations or food or gifts—and since Joy married last year and has a family of her own now, they hadn’t even a woman’s touch in the home until Kes’s own wedding this past summer.  I doubt there was any Christmas spirit in the place last year at all!”

Personally, Ben believed that the only joy Poe and Llewyn’s elder sister ever brought to that household had been via her name.  She had always struck him as a nagging harpy, and he had been grudgingly grateful to his father, Han, for nixing Leia’s plans to arrange a marriage between Joy and either Ben or Al.  It had been one of the few times Han’s wishes won out over Leia’s, and she had only agreed after Han compromised by hiring Poe as a clerk in the Solos’ thriving mercantile business.  Ben hadn’t been crazy about that idea either, but having Poe in the business was far better than having Joy in the family.

“But what about Mr. Dameron’s new family?” Al was asking Leia when Ben caught up to the conversation.  “The widow he married has several children, doesn’t she?  I would think Poe and, um, Llewyn would have a fine time with them.  Not that I begrudge the twins attending our party,” he added hastily.

Ben rolled his eyes at his brother.  “Al, you’re daft!  Even if their mother _did_ die some twenty years ago, do you really believe Poe and Llewyn want to spend Christmas with the woman their father replaced her with?  For that matter, the widow can’t be older than forty, and her children are actual _children_.”  Ben shuddered as he said the word.  “What’s more, Mr. Dameron practically kicked his sons out of their own home so he could move his new brood in, and—”

“Benjamin, that is _enough!_ ” Leia snapped.  “I will not have you speaking ill of Kes Dameron!  He is a good, kind-hearted man, and I’m sure his children are as happy as I am that he has finally found love again so many years after Shara’s passing.  What’s more, you should not pass judgment on matters you know little about.  Kes told Poe he was welcome to stay in the family home until he married himself one day, but Poe chose to rent rooms elsewhere in order to give his father’s family more space.  As for Llewyn, he was still at sea when the marriage took place—you know he only returned a month ago.”

“Yes, and Father gave _him_ a job right away too,” grumbled Ben.  “At least he had enough sense to put that good-for-nothing lout on the docks where he can’t cause as much trouble as if he were in the office like Poe.”

Somewhat to Ben’s surprise, Al turned on him and protested, “Ben, that’s wicked of you to say!  Llewyn is not good-for-nothing, nor—nor is he a lout!”

Ben blinked at his brother and asked, “Al, you _do_ know why he got sent to sea in the first place, correct?  For keeping company with married women?”  Al’s pale face flushed a deep red that extended all the way out to his large ears, and Leia gave an affronted noise of protest.

“Ben, you know full well such matters are not proper topics of conversation in our household!”

“Then perhaps the men who engage in such matters are not proper guests for our household either!” Ben shot back.

“Everyone deserves a second chance, Ben,” Al said suddenly, surprising his brother a second time.  When Ben turned back to him, Al’s blush had faded a little, although he was looking down at the floor instead of at Ben or Leia.  “Llewyn hasn’t gotten into any more trouble since he’s been back, at least not since he’s been working for Father. . . and of course Poe never does _anything_ improper.  And we can’t invite Poe without Llewyn.”

“We could not invite _either_ of them,” Ben suggested one last time, but he had already given it up as a lost cause.

“We are not leaving those two boys alone in those squalid rented rooms on Christmas, and that is final,” Leia insisted.  Then her hard face softened, and she sighed, “Ben, what _I_ can’t understand is why you’re so resistant to the idea of inviting Poe and Llewyn to our Christmas party.  You know that their mother was one of my closest friends, but even putting that aside. . . you and Al played with the Dameron boys all the time when you were children!  I know that’s been many years ago now, but why have you changed so toward them?  Surely it’s not because they are poor—I would hope that I’ve raised you better than that.”

“Of course it’s not that!  It’s only that I grew up, Mother,” muttered Ben.  “Al and I aren’t boys anymore, and neither are the Damerons.  Yes, we were friends as children, but like you said—that was many years ago.  We all have changed, and we’re very different from one another now.  You can’t force us to be friends again.”

Leia frowned at him a moment, then got up from her chair and returned to the tree.  Ben allowed himself to relax a little, since her movement likely meant the conversation was close to an end.

“I am not forcing you to be friends,” she replied at length.  “I only wish for you to behave civilly to our guests—that includes you too, Al, although you don’t seem to mind their coming as much as Ben.”

“I-I don’t mind,” Al stammered.  “I. . . I understand what Ben means, though.  We _were_ friends once.  Llewyn—Llewyn was my _best_ friend.”  Perhaps Leia did not notice it, but Ben heard the faint tremor in his brother’s deep voice, and he looked over at Al in concern.  Al was still staring at the floor, yet the afternoon sunlight coming in through the parlor window reflected off unshed tears gathering in his eyes.

 _What happened?_ Ben wondered in amazement.  While he did his best to avoid both of the Dameron brothers while at work, he knew that Al’s position in the company sometimes took him down to the docks where Llewyn loaded and unloaded freight from the ships on the Thames.  Had they run into each other on the docks, where Llewyn said or did something to hurt Al?  Ben unconsciously clenched both his large hands into fists at his sides as he vowed to make Llewyn pay for it, if so.

Oblivious to his brother’s worry, Al went on, “But then you sent Ben and me away to school, and. . . well, like he said, we all grew up.  When we came back, things had changed.  So I’m glad Poe and Llewyn will be here today, but—but I know how _you_ feel, too,” he finished, suddenly raising his head to address Ben.  Ben swallowed, then nodded.

After a moment, Leia said quietly, “I’m sorry if this is uncomfortable for either of you, but you do not have to spend time with them—there will be plenty of other guests here for them, and for you, to talk to.  Just be polite and make them feel welcome when they arrive.  Can you two do that much for me?”

“Yes, Mother,” muttered Ben, at the same time as Al agreed.

“All right.  Now, the guests will begin arriving soon, so go make yourselves presentable.”  Leia finally looked over her shoulder at them, and she smiled.  Al smiled back, although Ben did not.  As he followed his brother upstairs to the bedroom they shared, Ben wondered if he should ask Al what had upset him.

 _No, not now,_ he decided.  _It might only upset him more to discuss it, and I want him to enjoy Mother’s party even if I do not.  We can talk about it tomorrow._

Besides, whenever Al talked about Llewyn, Ben thought about Poe.  While Al brushed his own shorter hair, Ben combed his long hair out slowly and remembered how Al had said, “Llewyn was my _best_ friend.”

 _Yes_ , Ben thought, _and Poe was mine.  And then Mother and Father sent us away to school, so we didn’t see our best friends for such a long time.  When we came home for Christmas, I was so excited because I would get to visit Poe.  But then I went to our secret place where we always met, and—_

Ben clenched his teeth and shut off his stream of thoughts right there.  He slammed his comb down on their dresser so hard, Al jumped at the loud noise it made and looked over at his brother.

“Is something the matter, Ben?”

“Only that I wish I could stay up here instead of going down to that ridiculous party,” replied Ben.  He picked up a ribbon to tie back his hair and added, “‘Tis a pity I don’t wear a mustache, and you don’t wear your hair long.  Otherwise, we could pretend to be one another, and each of us would only have to attend half of it.”

Al laughed and took his brother’s arm to coax him out of the room when Ben was finished with his hair.  “It won’t be so very bad—at least we’ll have a delicious dinner to look forward to, and Father’s punch.  And games!  There will be games.”

“Oh, _wonderful_ ,” groaned Ben.  “I hate games.”

“At least Mother won’t force _you_ to play the piano for everyone,” Al sighed, but he brightened again and added, “Oh, but Father’s hunting companions are coming!  She relented and let him invite them.  I know they’ll drink too much punch and start telling all kinds of inappropriate stories before the night is through.”

Ben stopped Al on the landing before the stairs, looked his brother in the eye, and said, “Al?  Do be quiet.  You’re only making it worse.”  Al blinked; then Ben’s wide mouth twitched in a smile he couldn’t quite suppress.  A few seconds later, they both burst into laughter, and even Ben was still smiling a little when they went downstairs to greet the first guests to arrive.

\--

To be continued


	2. Chapter 2

Half an hour past the start of the party, the Dameron twins had still not arrived.  Ben assumed that meant they weren’t coming at all, and he finally began to relax a little, even in the parlor amidst all of his mother’s other guests.  Most of them were relatives or friends of his parents, although he and Al had each invited a couple friends. . . or acquaintances in Ben’s case.  Ben was talking with one of those, a young man named Armitage Hux who worked as an accountant for Ben’s father’s company, when a servant ushered two latecomers into the party.

Ben’s back was to the parlor doors, but Hux’s green eyes fixed on the new arrivals over Ben’s shoulder, and he muttered, “Hmph, Poe Dameron just turned up with his worthless brother.  I can’t imagine having the nerve to appear so late!”

“Llewyn never did have any class, and Poe knows my mother will be delighted to see him, no matter what,” Ben scoffed in reply; however, he felt shaky with nervousness when he turned to look at the two brothers.  Al was already hurrying over to greet them, as was Leia.  She gave Ben a stern glance that commanded him to pay tribute to the Dameron twins as well.

“I’ll return in a moment,” Ben sighed to Hux, who chuckled in a disdainful way.  Ben trudged to the doorway where Leia embraced Poe, and the handsome young man returned the gesture with tenderness.  The sight made Ben bristle with resentment for all sorts of reasons: that his mother should show someone else more affection than she showed him, that she should be so familiar with Poe when she knew how Ben disliked him, that Poe should flaunt their closeness in front of Leia’s own sons.  Not that one of those sons was paying any attention—Al was preoccupied with greeting Llewyn.

“Um, Merry Christmas, Llewyn,” he stammered with a smile that looked as nervous as Ben felt.  “I’m very glad you and Poe decided to join us.”

Llewyn had been glaring at the floor since he trailed into the room behind his brother, but he finally glanced up at Al.  Like Ben and Al, Poe and Llewyn were identical twins; yet their individual styles differed even more than did those of the Solo brothers.  Llewyn had the same low-lidded, long-lashed, soulful brown eyes as his brother, but he wore a short beard whereas Poe kept his face clean shaven.  While Poe took the utmost care with his appearance—too much care, Ben sometimes thought when he caught Poe combing his hair or adjusting his cravat during working hours—Llewyn clearly had made no attempt to polish his shoes or tame his mess of dark curls before the party.  Ben wondered if he had even pressed his clothes.  Judging from how wrinkled they appeared, Ben doubted it.

“Merry Christmas,” Llewyn mumbled, and when Poe gave him a glance as stern as what Leia had given Ben, Llewyn added, “Thank you for inviting us.  It was kind of you.”

“It was our pleasure,” Leia told him.  “Now come warm up by the fire—you look positively frozen.”  She took Llewyn’s arm in one hand and Al’s in the other, and drew them both away from the door.  That left Ben to face Poe alone.  He looked down into his former friend’s face and cleared his throat.  Poe lifted his eyes to Ben’s with a smile shier than the one he’d given Leia.

“I’m very sorry we’re so late,” he murmured.  “It was Llewyn’s fault of course—he was off somewhere and didn’t get home until after we should have already set out.  I think he was hoping I’d leave without him and he wouldn’t have to come at all, you know how he hates social events.  Of course, I didn’t tell your mother any of that!”

Apparently, some things hadn’t changed: Poe still talked too much when he was nervous.  Ben had once found the habit rather endearing, but now he interrupted Poe’s rambling with a curt reply.

“It’s no matter—you know that you can do no wrong as far as Mother is concerned.  She is simply glad you came.”

Poe’s expressive eyes bore straight into Ben’s soul as he asked, “And you?  Are you glad?”

“Of course,” replied Ben as coolly as he could manage.  “I would not want Mother to be disappointed.  Now you should go join her and your brother by the fire.  I must attend to the other guests.”

Ben turned away from Poe as he spoke, because while he did want to hurt Poe, he also didn’t think he could bear to see that hurt reflected in the other man’s beautiful eyes.  _And who’s to say I even **have** hurt him?_ Ben argued with himself after he had rejoined Hux near Leia’s Christmas tree.  _Poe hasn’t cared about me in years, not since I left for school.  Why **should** he be hurt if I’m rude to him?  He might be offended, but only that._

He distracted himself by relating to Hux the story of why the Damerons were late to the party.  Hux harrumphed at Poe’s excuse, then put forth the theory that Llewyn was out “making love”—Hux said the words with infinite disdain and a curl to his chapped and winter-reddened lips—to some woman of ill repute and lost track of the time.

“On Christmas Day?” Ben asked, eyebrow raised.  He wasn’t sure that even Llewyn would go that far.

“Yes,” sniffed Hux.  “On Christmas Day.”  Hux always suspected the worst of everyone, and Ben supposed that was what made him so good with managing and protecting the company’s money.

Just then, Leia stopped her guests’ chatter with the moment Al had been dreading, when she asked him to entertain everyone by playing the piano.  He had always enjoyed music and shown far more talent for it than Ben ever did.  Likewise, Llewyn had an aptitude for music where Poe did not, and the Solos had even paid for him to take lessons along with Al when the boys were children.  Once their voices changed, Al and Llewyn sang together nicely, with Al’s much deeper voice making a fine accompaniment for Llewyn’s; however, Ben hadn’t heard Llewyn sing in years, and he doubted Al had either.

Al still played, though, and he went obediently to the upright piano when his mother commanded it, although he blushed all the way to his ears.  When he glanced back at Ben, Ben gave his brother a rare and encouraging smile, which Al returned faintly before he began to perform.  He really was quite good, and Ben’s smile grew when he saw how impressed their guests were—even the ladies, who typically paid Al little attention.  The aloof young lady who was attending the party with Hux, Miss Phasma, looked at Al as if he had suddenly appeared out of the aether.

“Your brother is very talented,” she told Ben.  It was the first time she’d praised anyone or anything all evening.  Since she was taller than either Hux or Ben, she managed to make even the compliment seem intimidating.

“Thank you, I will be certain to tell him you said so,” Ben assured her.  Better he do that than allow Phasma to talk to Al herself; Al would be terrified.

After Al had played a few short pieces, his mother spoke up again, but not to him this time.  Instead, she turned to where the Dameron brothers were standing by the fireplace and asked, “Llewyn, do you still sing?”

Llewyn, who had been staring into the fire in a sulky manner, jumped and gave her a startled look.

“Uh, I—no, I don’t, really,” he stammered.  Poe was talking quietly with some of the other guests, but when he heard his brother’s answer, he made a face and turned around to Llewyn.

“Don’t be ridiculous, of course you still sing,” he scolded Llewyn.  “I can hardly get you to keep your mouth shut at home so I can have some peace and quiet!”  Several guests chuckled, and Llewyn glared darkly at his brother.  Ben could not blame him, and he felt smugly irritated at Poe himself.  What right had he to force his brother to perform at a party Llewyn didn’t want to attend in the first place?

Every right in the world, apparently, at least in Leia’s opinion, for she encouraged Llewyn, “I do wish you’d sing something for us.  Al will play for you, and I remember how well you two sounded together when you were younger.”

“That was a long time ago,” muttered Llewyn, but Poe and many of the other guests pled with him to capitulate, so he sighed and trudged over to the corner of the piano.  When Al glanced up at Llewyn, Llewyn asked, “Do you mind it?  I suppose I can sing if you don’t mind playing for me.”

“I don’t mind it,” Al murmured in reply, so quietly Ben could hardly hear him.  “What shall I play?”

Llewyn thought a moment before responding, “Do you still know ‘Greensleeves’?  I’ve learned Dix’s new words to the tune, so I could sing those.”

Al smiled.  “Of course I still know it!  It’s one of Mother’s favorites, don’t you remember how she liked it?”  He turned back to the piano and began to play the old melody.  Llewyn cleared his throat and watched Al’s large hands moving over the ivory keys for a moment before he began to sing.

_What child is this, who laid to rest on Mary’s lap is sleeping,_   
_Whom angels greet with anthems sweet while shepherds watch are keeping?_   
_This, this is Christ the king, whom shepherds guard and angels sing._   
_Haste, haste to bring Him laud, the babe, the son of Mary._

Llewyn’s voice sounded a bit harsh and scratchy to Ben, but accompanied by Al’s melodious playing, the lyrics took on a poignant tone that suited them well.  Al kept his eyes fixed on the piano as he played, and Llewyn now gazed at the floor.  Ben risked a glance at Poe and found him watching the two with a slight, puzzled frown.  He seemed to be as concerned about the awkwardness between Al and Llewyn as Ben was.

After singing two verses of the new words, Llewyn suddenly shifted back to the old, familiar lyrics Ben’s mother liked so well.  Leia had never told her sons why she was so fond of the song, but once, her brother Luke had revealed to them that Han Solo had spent a whole year sarcastically referring to her as “Lady Greensleeves” after she had rejected his proposal of marriage.  At the time, Leia claimed to despise the nickname, but once she relented and married Han, she became awfully fond of the tune by the same name.

At first, Llewyn still looked down as he sang, but after a few measures, he glanced up at Al.  Yet Al did not look anywhere but at the piano, and Ben could see no expression on his face that was not normally present when he played the familiar song for their mother:

_Alas, my love, you do me wrong, to cast me off discourteously,_   
_For I have loved you well and long, delighting in your company._   
_Greensleeves was all my joy, Greensleeves was my delight,_   
_Greensleeves was my heart of gold, who but my Lady Greensleeves._

_Alas, my love, that you should own a heart of wanton vanity,_   
_So must I meditate alone upon your insincerity._   
_Greensleeves was all my joy, Greensleeves was my delight,_   
_Greensleeves was my heart of gold, who but my Lady Greensleeves._

Hearing the words sung in Llewyn’s voice, Ben for the first time thought of them not in connection with his mother, but with Poe.  Ben clenched his jaw and jerked his eyes over to Poe, who was still watching Llewyn.  _A heart of wanton vanity, of insincerity,_ Ben thought.

Llewyn sang a few more verses, then finished with a final plea:

_I will pray to God on high that thou my constancy mayst see,  
And that yet once before I die, thou wilt vouchsafe to love me._  
_Greensleeves was all my joy, Greensleeves was my delight,_  
_Greensleeves was my heart of gold, who but my Lady Greensleeves._

Before his brother reached the chorus, Poe turned and looked at Ben.  His large, dark eyes shone with emotion that cut through all of Ben’s bitterness and resentment.  Ben dragged his own gaze away and watched Al instead.  A tear glistened in the corner of Al’s eye, beside his prominent nose.

As soon as Llewyn finished the chorus, Al ceased playing and wiped his eye with one knuckle, smearing the tear away before anyone but Ben noticed it.  When the party guests praised him and Llewyn for their performance, Al thanked them shyly but graciously, and Llewyn mumbled something before slinking away.

Ben went over to the piano and put a hand on Al’s shoulder.  As soon as Al was no longer the center of attention, Ben leaned down and murmured, “Are you all right?”  Al nodded and reached up to pat Ben’s hand.

“I am,” he whispered back.  He looked up at Ben and smiled, but Ben didn’t think the smile was quite as wide or as genuine as normal.  Before Ben could press the issue, Al stood up from the piano and went on, “Mother will be trying to gather everyone for dinner now.  We should go help—it will likely take both of us to rein in Father’s hunting companions.  That large one with the long blond hair, he looks like he could be trouble!” he added with a chuckle.

“All right,” Ben gave in, even though he thought their mother was perfectly capable of ordering the men around on her own.  As he assisted Al in steering the guests toward their dining room, Ben managed to avoid both Llewyn and Poe.  He had begun to suspect that whatever Llewyn had done to hurt Al, it had much in common with what Poe had done to hurt _him_ , and Ben wanted nothing to do with either of the Damerons for the rest of the evening.

\--

To be continued


	3. Chapter 3

Ben remained quiet throughout most of dinner.  No one really noticed since simply eating kept the party    busy enough; Leia and the Solos’ cook had prepared _that_ much food, including a variety of game provided by Han and the other members of his hunting party.  Even Llewyn appeared to enjoy the meal, and Poe chattered brightly with the guests seated near him as he ate.

After the meal, as the servants cleared the table, Leia gathered her sons and their guests back in the parlor, where she announced they would pass the early part of the evening by playing games.  Ben barely suppressed a moan, for he hated games, but Al cheered up considerably.  They began with Blind Man’s Bluff, in which one man in the party was chosen as “It” and put on a blindfold, then chased the female guests about the room until he caught one; then he had to identify her solely by touching her face.

This game didn’t go so well, since the first man blindfolded—a rather untrustworthy hunter—“caught” Miss Phasma, who had refused to play and was only stalking across the room to get a glass of water from the kitchen.  (When Leia had gently suggested that a servant could bring her some water instead, Phasma retorted that she was perfectly capable of retrieving it herself.)  Identifying Phasma was simple enough because no other lady in attendance was so tall that “It” had to reach up to find her face.   When he did so, and she slapped his hand away with a snarl, “It” only chuckled and named her as his captive.

“I do believe I’m entitled to some sort of reward for a correct guess?” he added as he tugged off his blindfold and looked up into the stormy blue eyes glaring down at him.  “A kiss is customary, right?”

“You can kiss my shoe when I kick you in the face,” Phasma retorted before she turned on her heel and stormed away to the kitchen.

Al shyly suggested they play something a bit more tame, so they began a game of Twenty Questions instead.  After several rounds of that, when several of the guests started to grow bored, Poe grinned and said, “Why don’t we play another game for a while?”

Leia raised an eyebrow and asked him, “Since you look as if you already have something in mind, why don’t you share your idea with the rest of us, my dear?”

“We should play Tossing the Smile,” Poe announced.

Immediately, Llewyn groaned, “I _hate_ that game.”

“Of course you do,” replied Poe, “but then, you hate _everything_.”  Almost the entire population of the room laughed—except for Al, who glared at Poe, much to Ben’s satisfaction—before Poe continued, “Anyhow, let’s play, and I’ll be ‘It’ to start.  You have five seconds to get straight faces!”  He stood and made a theatrical demonstration of looking at his pocket watch to count the seconds down.  Llewyn rolled his eyes and slumped back in his chair with his arms folded.  He clearly was in no danger of accidentally smiling and thus getting struck out of the game.

Neither were many of the other guests, Ben concluded.  He himself was not given to smiling, nor were Hux and Phasma.  While some of his father’s friends were jovial, others seemed quite stern, and overall, Ben wondered if even Poe, for all his charisma and teasing grin, could trick anyone into smiling before Poe “tossed” his own smile to another player.

When the five seconds were up, Poe shoved his watch back into his pocket and began to stalk around the room with a broad smile plastered on his mouth while the rest of the guests sat stony-faced.  _It really **is** a stupid game,_ thought Ben as he watched Poe score his first victory.  It came more easily than Ben had suspected, for he had forgotten how easily a handsome face could charm his mother’s friend Mrs. Kanata.  Poe had only to give her a lingering look with his soulful brown eyes to get a not-entirely-chaste smirk in response.

Mrs. Kanata accepted her defeat, and the onlookers’ resulting laughter, with good grace.  Han threw his head back and cackled (probably glad that his wife wasn’t the only older woman enamored with Poe, Ben concluded bitterly), while his closest companion Chewbacca grumbled something.  That heavy-bearded gentleman was one of the sterner members in the hunting party, and the usual recipient of Mrs. Kanata’s attentions.  Even though Chewbacca usually ignored her bids for his affection, it seemed that he wasn’t pleased at having to share, all the same.

Poe graciously ruled that the laughter didn’t count as smiling since everyone was guilty, so faces were cleared of emotion, and the game began again.  He managed to tempt a couple more guests into smiling, and Ben kept his eyes on Poe all the while.  Yet Poe never looked at Ben once, despite Ben’s desire to prove that Poe could not make him smile.

Then Poe decided it was time to “toss the smile” on to the next “It” of the game.  Dramatically, he passed his hand over his face and assumed a solemn expression before folding his hand into a fist as if he had caught his smile inside it.  _How silly!_ Ben thought—until Poe finally did look his way and mimicked tossing his smile right to Ben.

Ben stared at Poe, and everyone else stared at Ben.  Then, even though only a moment before Ben had been so certain he was immune to Poe’s allure, he couldn’t help smiling.  Poe’s eyes lit up, and he kept them fixed on Ben as he took his seat and Ben stood.  Ben knew that his smile could be considered awkward and unattractive—he did have the same wide mouth as his brother, after all—so he wasn’t surprised that some of the other guests smirked to see it.  He took pleasure in striking them out of the game.

When Ben glanced at his brother, Al maintained his solemn expression—so solemn, in fact, Ben actually smiled more broadly himself.  Llewyn remained slouched his chair and scowling.  Ben looked over at Poe, their eyes met. . . and Poe smiled too.  Not, Ben realized, because he meant to mock or laugh at Ben but because it truly made Poe happy to see a smile on Ben’s face.

Unfortunately, everyone else noticed Poe breaking the rules too, and someone called, “Poe smiled!  He’s out!”

“So I am,” Poe agreed mildly, without the smile leaving his face.

Ben kept his turn at the game short and soon tossed his smile to Hux, just to spite him.  As hard as it was not to laugh at Hux’s flustered reaction, Ben managed to keep himself under control so he could stay in the game; he couldn’t stand the thought of losing, especially to Hux.  Yet he looked over at Poe frequently as well, just to see if Poe still wore that mysterious smile.  He did, and he kept his lovely eyes fixed on Ben so that by the time everyone finally tired of playing Tossing the Smile, Ben could think of nothing else.

_Did Poe suggest we play that game just so he could force me to smile at him?_ Ben wondered as the guests separated into smaller groups to amuse themselves.  Some decided to play games with cards, while others sat down to talk—or in some cases to flirt as much as propriety allowed.  Ben searched for Poe and eventually spotted him standing close to the Christmas tree with his brother, where Poe appeared to be trying to pique Llewyn’s interest in the decorations.

“Do you think he’s having a good time?”  The sudden deep voice in Ben’s ear made him jump.  He turned to look at Al, who had appeared beside him and was watching the other set of twins with a frown.

“If you’re referring to Llewyn, I doubt it,” Ben muttered in reply.  “At least, he doesn’t look as if he’s enjoying himself.”  In fact, Llewyn was at that moment rolling his eyes at something Poe had said.

“Oh,” Al sighed.  “I was afraid he wouldn’t.”  Ordinarily, Ben would not have interfered in his brother’s friendships, or lack thereof, but Al sounded too unhappy for him to stand by and do nothing.

Ben told Al, “You should go talk to him.  He doesn’t like games, and he hasn’t spoken with anyone but his own brother all night, so it’s no wonder he’s bored.”

Al stared at Ben with an almost hopeful look in his eyes before dropping them and mumbling, “Llewyn doesn’t want to talk to _me_.”

“I’m certain that he does,” Ben insisted.  “You didn’t see how he was watching you at the piano, as he sang.  He looked at you like. . . well, the way Father looks at Mother after they’ve had a fight, and he wants to apologize but doesn’t know what to say.”

“But we _never_ had a fight,” Al murmured.  “That’s just it.  We never quarreled, he just decided he didn’t like me anymore.  It wasn’t—wasn’t like what happened with you and Poe.”  Ben’s face felt hot, as it was the first time Al had ever brought up Ben’s past with Poe, yet he pushed his irritation aside for his brother’s sake.

“Then perhaps that is why he wants to apologize.  I don’t know what occurred with the two of you, or why you think Llewyn stopped wanting to be your friend, but I know that you miss him. . . and I believe he misses you.”  Ben lifted his hand, hesitated, then placed it on Al’s shoulder as he swore, “He looked at you with such longing, Al.  At least give him the chance to speak with you, then if he does not take it, you will have done all you could.”

Al’s eyes darted back up to meet Ben’s.  They searched Ben’s face for a moment; then Al said, “All right.  I’ll go talk to Llewyn. . . if you come with me and talk to Poe.”

Ben clenched his jaw and looked from Al to Poe and back again; then he sighed and nodded.  Grasping Al’s elbow, Ben made his way over to the Christmas tree and steered his twin along beside him.  Poe glanced up at their approach, but when he saw just who was coming toward him and Llewyn, he drew in his breath with a soft hiss and nudged his brother in the side.

“What is it _now_ , Poe?” Llewyn grumbled.

“Llewyn,” said Poe.

“ _What?_ ”

“Um,” said Al.  Llewyn finally raised his head from where he had been glaring at one of the ornaments tied to the tree.  He stared at Al until Al flushed, looked away again, and mumbled, “We wanted to see if you were enjoying yourselves.  The two of you, that is.”

Poe immediately assured him, “Yes, of course we are.”  He smiled at Al, who didn’t see as his head was still turned away, so Poe smiled up at Ben instead.  Once again, Ben found himself unable to resist the urge to smile back, at least a little—until Al stunned him by challenging Poe’s claim.

“Are you, truly?  Llewyn looks very unhappy.”  Although he addressed his comments to Poe, Al turned back to Llewyn as he spoke.  Llewyn stared once more, but now he looked almost guilty.

“I—I’m not—that is. . . .”  Llewyn swallowed and muttered, “I’m sorry I haven’t been a very polite guest.  It’s a nice party, and I _am_ enjoying myself, thank you.”  He hardly sounded sincere, but at the same time, he _did_ sound as if he were trying to make Al feel better.  Al nodded and took a cautious step closer to the other, much shorter man.

“I hope so,” he told Llewyn.  “You sang very nicely earlier.  It was—was wonderful to hear you sing again.”

“Really?” asked Llewyn.

“Really.  I’ve missed your singing.  Very much,” Al blurted out.  Llewyn lowered his eyes, but when Al’s shoulders slumped and he tried to turn away, Llewyn reached out and put his hand on Al’s arm.

He murmured, “You played beautifully, yourself.  I didn’t think you’d kept up with it.”

The tension fell away from Ben’s own shoulders when he saw Llewyn and Al talking, but then Poe touched Ben’s hand and made him tense up all over again.

“Could I speak with you, Ben?  Alone?” Poe whispered.  When Ben looked down into Poe’s handsome, worried face, something in his expression must have concerned Poe, for he added plaintively, “ _Please?_ ”

Ben could resist that plea no more than he could resist Poe’s smile.  He nodded and looked first at Llewyn and Al to be sure they were still occupied, then at the rest of the room to ascertain that no one else was watching.  Then he took Poe’s arm and drew him away from the tree.  As he led Poe along the wall of the room to the parlor doors, Ben felt Poe’s hand close over his.  Ben grew even more tense than before, but he did not try to take his hand away.

\--

To be continued


	4. Chapter 4

Ben took Poe to the small room his mother called the library.  In truth, it was no more than an oversized closet whose walls she had lined with shelves, where she kept her collection of books.  Leia sometimes sat there to read, and she had outfitted the room with a stove to keep it warm in winter.  Ben decided to bring Poe there because he knew they would not be disturbed.

The stove had been burning earlier that day, so the room was still warm when Ben showed Poe in and sat him down on the loveseat where Leia did her reading.  Ben had intended to remain standing, but with the way he towered over Poe in the dim room, where the only light came from the small lamp he’d brought with them, Ben felt as if he were presiding over an interrogation.  Poe’s nervous, nearly frightened expression didn’t help.  Ben ended up sitting down beside Poe instead—close beside him, since the loveseat was small, and Ben was rather large.  He leaned forward with his arms braced on his knees and, to avoid looking at Poe, stared into the grate of the stove at the embers still glowing inside.

“Well, what did you want to say?” Ben muttered.

Poe stammered upon starting out, but then his voice grew stronger: “I. . . I didn’t want to _say_ anything.  I wanted us to _talk_.  Ben, hasn’t this gone on long enough?  It’s been _years_.”

Ben asked, “What has?” although of course he knew very well what Poe meant.

“You know very well what I mean,” said Poe.

Ben sighed and turned to face Poe after all.  The smaller man no longer looked frightened, only hurt, which was somehow worse even though just a few hours earlier, hurting Poe was exactly what Ben had wanted to do.

“Poe,” Ben mumbled, “I. . . we were friends once, but you’re right, it _has_ been years.  What use is talking about it _now_?  It was over a long time ago.”

“Not for me,” whispered Poe.  His eyes shone in the lamp light, and he blinked them hard; then his eyebrows drew together angrily.  “But I tried.  I tried to be as cold to you as you are to me.”  He spoke so judgmentally, Ben felt angry too.  What right had _Poe_ to judge _him_?

Ben muttered, “How else do you expect me to act?”  Poe shrugged.

“Angry, I suppose.  You’ve always had such an unreasonable temper.  But even you can’t stay angry for years and years, so once that fire burnt out, I guess. . . this was all that was left of—of us.”  When he said the word “this,” Poe gestured at the two of them with his hand.  Ben looked down at that small hand, which looked even smaller and darker than usual in the flickering lamp light, and in contrast to the white lace of his shirt’s cuff protruding from the sleeve of the mulberry jacket he was wearing.  Ben had never seen a more perfect, more beautiful hand before in his life.

“Of course I was angry,” he growled to hide the huskiness in his voice.  “I had been away from home for months.  I hadn’t seen or spoken to you—my best friend—for _months_.  I hated that school, and everyone there hated me.  I didn’t have a single friend there except for Al, and I was so happy to be coming home. . . so happy to be seeing you again.”

Ben shifted his whole body on the loveseat to face away from Poe before he continued, because he couldn’t trust himself not to break down if he accidentally caught a glimpse of Poe’s eyes, or even of his damned hand, for that matter.

He continued, “And I wrote you that I was coming, I told you the day and the very hour I would meet you where we always met to play, in back of Father’s warehouse.  You wrote me back and said you would be there—you knew—you _knew_ , Poe!”  Ben’s voice broke, and he cleared his throat.

“Ben—” Poe tried to interrupt, but Ben cut him off. 

“And then when I came to meet you, you were there with someone else,” Ben pressed onward, “holding her, _kissing_ her.”  He clenched his hands into fists and drove them deep into the velvet of the loveseat in order to resist the urge to start throwing his mother’s books around as he finally asked the questions which had plagued him since that day.

“Why did you not simply write that you didn’t want to see me?  You might have told me you’d rather spend your time with your—your _conquest_ than with me.  Or at the very least, you might have just not come at all.  I can’t say I wouldn’t have been angry, but even to leave me waiting for you in vain would not have been so cruel as—as what you did!”

“Ben, that wasn’t the reason why, you know it wasn’t!” Poe protested.  His voice trembled as if he too were furious, or as if he too were close to tears.

“I know nothing about your reasons,” Ben retorted, then refused to speak further, nor to look at the other man even though he could hear each shaky breath Poe drew, and each of those breaths made Ben ache.  Ben reminded himself of his own pain when he came running around the back corner of the warehouse, breathless and anxious that he would be late to meet Poe, and saw the friend he missed so dearly there with someone else.  Poe had obviously brought the girl there to court her, for she was seated in his lap, kissing him.  The two of them hadn’t even noticed Ben’s arrival until he shouted at them.  He _had_ thrown something then, an empty crate left in the alley, while Poe leapt to his feet and nearly dumped the girl right on the ground.  Ignoring whatever Poe was trying to say, Ben had turned and run away.

Ben never told anyone, not even Al, what had happened to end his friendship with Poe.  Nor did he ever confess why he had remained so embittered for so long—that when he saw Poe kissing someone else, Ben felt envy almost too intense to bear.  As he dwelt upon that moment in the days and weeks that followed, Ben realized his feelings were not normal, even for a boy whose best friend had discovered courtship and no longer had time for him.  He was not merely jealous; he _hated_ the girl who had stolen Poe from him, because Ben wanted to be the one kissing Poe and holding him.  At some point as he grew from a child into a young man, Ben’s feelings of friendship for Poe had grown into love, yet he never realized it until he lost Poe to another.

_And he chose to tell me by flaunting her in front of me, there in the place that was supposed to be ours alone!_   Ben’s eyes hurt with the urge to weep at the memories, so he pressed them closed with the heel of his palm.  Over the years, his anger really had burnt out, as Poe had put it, but Ben’s love for Poe never had.  The fact that he still hurt so deeply told him as much.

When Ben said nothing more after a minute, Poe timidly asked, “Ben?”  Finding himself neither interrupted nor snarled at, he continued, “I told you that I tried to act cold towards you and pretend that I don’t care about you anymore. . . but I can’t carry on like that, because it just isn’t true.  After all these years, I can’t keep up this façade that’s so—so contrary to my nature and how I feel!”

Poe paused to take a deep breath before he finished, “So tonight, instead, I tried to make you smile at me, the way you used to.  And when you did, I felt truly warm inside for the first time in all those years.  I felt like things might one day be as they used to be between us.  The way they’re meant to be.”

“Poe,” Ben muttered, “that. . . it was only a game.  A silly parlor game.”  He jumped and dropped his hand from his eyes when he felt Poe grip his shoulder tightly enough to hurt.

“Then tell me what to do to make it real!” Poe cried.  “I apologized, again and again, and then I waited—I’ve been waiting _years_ for you!  If all that isn’t enough for you to forgive me, then tell me what else you want from me.  Haven’t you punished me enough?”

Ben protested in disbelief, “You _apologized_?”  He finally turned to face Poe once again and immediately regretted it when he saw the pleading look in the other man’s eyes.  Ben tried to ignore that as he scoffed, “You _never_ apologized!  You never even tried to explain yourself—not that it was necessary since any fool could understand what was going on, but still!”

“I never. . . Ben, how can you _say_ that after I sent you all those letters?  I don’t know how many times I wrote the words ‘I’m sorry’!  Does that not count as apologizing since I didn’t speak them face to face?”  Poe scoffed with a mirthless laugh, “Believe me, I tried, but since you refused to see me, you didn’t leave me any other option but to write.”

“The letters,” Ben muttered.  He had forgotten all about the letters.  “You. . . you wrote that you were sorry?”

“ _Yes!_   Don’t you remember?”  Poe stared up at him and frowned when Ben didn’t reply.  “You did receive them, didn’t you?  Al gave them to you?”

Ben swallowed past the painful lump in his throat and mumbled, “I—he. . . .”

“He _promised_ me he would!” Poe exploded.  “All three of them!  Each time, he said you hadn’t replied and you still wouldn’t see me, so I wrote another, but then I finally gave up after the third—but if he never even gave them to you—”

“ _Poe!_ ” Ben interrupted Poe’s tirade.  The thought of poor Al getting blamed for Ben’s selfishness forced him to speak.  “Poe, he did, Al gave them to me.  But I—I didn’t read them.”

“What?” Poe breathed.  He was already staring at Ben, but his eyes widened further.  “You didn’t _read_ them?”

Ben dropped his own gaze and mumbled, “No, I was too hurt and angry.  I. . . I burned them.”

“Y-you— _Ben!_   How could you. . . even _you_.”  Ben didn’t try to answer him until Poe stumbled to his feet as he muttered, “You were looking for an excuse to cast me away.  You never even gave me a chance.”

Ben finally looked up, then grasped Poe’s arm before the other man could withdraw.  When Poe turned back to him in surprise, Ben said, “Poe, wait—please.  I’m. . . I’m sorry.”

“You’re _sorry?_ ”  Poe shook Ben’s hand off his arm, but at least he didn’t turn away.  “Could this mean you’re admitting, for once in your life, that you actually made a mistake?”

Pushing down the irritation Poe’s taunt raised in him, Ben nodded as meekly as he could and said, “I was wrong.  Please, will you sit down and tell me what the letters said?”

Poe’s demeanor softened immediately.  “You really want to know?”

After Ben nodded a second time, Poe returned to his seat.  Ben really did feel sorry—and guilty—for burning the letters, something he’d long since forgotten doing over the years of harboring his grudge against Poe.

“I can’t remember everything,” Poe told Ben, “but in short, I wrote that. . . that while you and Al were away, Llewyn and I were lonely.  Papa noticed how unhappy we were, so he arranged to introduce us to the daughters of an acquaintance of his.  The one they’d chosen for Llewyn—”  Poe paused long enough for a rueful half-smile and shake of his head. “–she and Llewyn couldn’t stand one another.  But the other girl and I got to be friends.”

Ben understood where Poe’s narrative was going, and he struggled to keep his jealousy in check.  At the same time, he wondered, _Where is she now?  Do you still see her?_   He knew that Poe had not yet married, but could he be courting the same woman after all that time?  Who would wait for him for so long?  _Who besides myself,_ thought Ben, who had never felt romantic interest for anyone else.

Poe continued, “Her name was Paige.  I suppose you might say we were courting, but I hadn’t thought of it like that—it just happened.  We were so young, and really, it was simply nice to feel something besides loneliness.”  He looked away and murmured, “I missed you so much, and I wanted to forget that for a while.  You can be angry at me for it if you like, but it’s the truth.”

“No, I’m not angry at you for it,” Ben told him on impulse.  “It hurts me to hear, but I can’t be angry.  I missed you just as much, Poe.”  Poe’s eyes darted back to Ben’s, and for the first time, they seemed a little brighter.

“You did?”

“Yes.  That’s why—”  Ben stopped himself and only repeated, “Yes.”

Poe nodded.  “When you wrote that you were coming home to visit for Christmas, I told Paige I wouldn’t see her very often while you were here.  You were going to be home for such a short while that I wanted to spend as much time with you as I could.  She asked to see me in the morning before you arrived, but I didn’t want to be late to meet you, so—so I told her about our place at the warehouse and asked her to meet me there.”

Poe lowered his head and mumbled, “I felt bad about it, sharing that place with someone besides you, but I just didn’t want there to be any chance I’d miss you!  And Paige meant to leave before you got there, truly, Ben!  We lost track of the time, and then. . . then you came upon us and got so angry.  I couldn’t understand why.”  He looked up at Ben through his eyelashes.  “Since you wouldn’t see me or let me explain, I wrote you the letter telling you what I just told you now.  Then when you didn’t answer it, I wrote you two more saying I was sorry, begging you to forgive me for telling Paige about our place, for her being there when you arrived. . . for everything I could think of that might have angered you.  But you still wouldn’t answer me, so when you and Al returned to school, I gave up.”

By the time Poe fell silent, his eyes were bright with tears again.  Ben lifted a hand toward Poe’s face, hesitated, then rested it on the smaller man’s shoulder instead.

“Poe, I truly am sorry.  I was wrong not to read what you wrote to me,” Ben said.  Then he steeled himself and made the much harder admission: “And I was wrong to misjudge you.  I always believed you meant to show me I no longer mattered to you.  That while I was gone, you’d grown up and left me behind.  If I had only read your letters instead of burning them like a fool, I would have known the truth.”

Poe lifted his head and beseeched, “How could you ever believe I would do such a thing?  I know I have a quick temper, and I’ve done hurtful things before, but even so—I’ve never, ever been _cruel_ , Ben, not to you or anyone else, before or since!”

“I realize that now, Poe.  I should have realized it from the start, and I am sorry.”  Ben remembered his first months away at school, and the much harder ones which followed the end of his friendship with Poe, and he sighed, “I had just seen how cruel people were out there in the world beyond my home, and I let them cloud my perception.  Between that, and jealousy, and my damned temper, I lost—everything.”

Ben mumbled the last world and looked away; but Poe reached up, caught Ben’s face in his hands, and made him turn back.

“Now stop that,” Poe chided him.  “I’m right here, aren’t I?  Too stubborn and persistent to be lost.  And I was still wrong as well.  Paige should not have been there at all that day, much less at the time I was to meet you, and it was my fault she was.  Since you didn’t read my original apology, I will apologize again: I’m sorry, Ben.  I’m sorry I hurt you, because you were my dearest friend a-and—and I want you back in my life again.  Please, will you forgive me?”

As he spoke, Poe began stroke one of Ben’s cheeks with his thumb while he cradled Ben’s face in both hands.  Ben had to bite his lower lip to stop it from quivering at Poe’s touch, much less at his words.  When Poe finally quit talking, it was all Ben could do simply to nod at first.

He stammered, “Y-yes, I do, Poe, I forgive you.  Will you?  Forgive me, I mean?”  Poe smiled at him, as warmly and beautifully as he had during their earlier game.

“Of course I will, you silly stork,” he replied.  Poe’s childish old nickname for him nearly made Ben tear up all over again.

Ben still had one hand on Poe’s shoulder, so he used it to draw Poe close enough to embrace him with the other arm.  He did these things with hesitation, but Poe immediately threw both arms around Ben’s neck and hugged him tightly.  Ben held Poe to his chest and pressed his cheek to the smaller man’s hair, still tense because it all felt unreal.  After so long, could he truly be granted the happiness he thought he’d lost forever?

_I mustn’t ever let it happen again,_ Ben told himself.  _No matter if he does court women and find a wife someday—I know my friendship will always be important to him.  He called me his dearest friend. . . ._

“Poe?” Ben mumbled into the other’s hair.  “You—you were my dearest friend too.  Always.  And you always will be.”

“And you will be mine.  Now that I have you back, I’m never letting you go again.”  Poe’s head rested on Ben’s shoulder, and the warmth of his breath tickling Ben’s neck made the larger man bite his lip again, this time to hold back a whimper.  Ben squinted at the bookshelves, trying to read the titles on the volumes there in the lamp light as a way of distracting himself from his desire for the man in his arms, until Poe spoke again.

“Ben?  You haven’t asked, but. . . do you want to know what happened with Paige, afterwards?”

Ben both did and did not want to know, but he reluctantly answered in the affirmative.  It was better to find out directly from Poe now, he decided, than to be surprised later.

“She was not very happy with me at first,” Poe admitted.  “After all, I did almost drop her on the ground when I saw you, and then I tried to go after you when you ran away that day.  I would have, except she stopped me and said to give you time to calm down.”

“Oh,” murmured Ben, both pleased to learn that Poe had wanted to pursue him, and wishing he had.

Poe continued, “So the next day I went to see Paige, and I apologized to her.  Then I. . . I told her I thought she and I should stay friends, but nothing more than that.”

Ben breathed, “ _Oh_.  Was—was she angry?”

“No, not at all, which was quite a relief,” Poe admitted with a faint chuckle.  “Paige agreed with me.  She said it was all too serious for her and that, well. . . I spent most of our time together talking about _you_ anyhow.  She told me I had the courtship and the friendship backwards.”

“Oh,” said Ben.

Poe chattered on, “I ran into her recently, the first time I’d seen her in two years, I think.  She hasn’t married yet, and she and her sister live together, the way Llewyn and I do.  And Llewyn and Paige’s sister _still_ don’t get along.  But then Llewyn hardly gets along with anyone. . . .”

“Poe?  She really said that, about courtship and—and me?” Ben blurted out.

“Hmm?  Oh. . . yes. . . .”  Poe shifted in Ben’s arms so he could see the larger man’s face.  He looked distinctly embarrassed as he stammered, “She, she was only teasing me, because I talked about you so much.  She didn’t mean that she thought you and I ever did anything. . . improper.”

Ben felt as if his heart broke at the word “improper,” even though he’d believed he’d done so well at shielding himself from holding false hope that Poe returned his feelings.

He looked away and mumbled, “Of course not, I know she would not think that of you.  I only. . . wondered about what she said.  That’s all.”

“Ben?”  Again Poe reached up, and again he turned Ben’s face back to his.  “Why does it upset you so?”

“It doesn’t—”

Poe huffed, “You think you can lie to me now, just because we’ve spent a few years apart?  I can read your face as well as ever, and you look absolutely wretched.  Please be honest with me, it’s the only way we can rebuild what we had.”  When Poe laid his hand against the side of Ben’s face, Ben leaned into his touch.

_I may well lose him all over again,_ Ben thought, _but if honesty is what he wants. . . ._

“I was in love with you then, Poe,” he said aloud.  “That’s the real reason why seeing you with her hurt me so, and why I would have given anything for just one of the kisses you gave her.  Even though it would have been ‘improper.’”

Poe’s wide, dark eyes remained fixed on Ben’s face as he repeated in a whisper, “You were in love with me.  But you—you aren’t any longer?  Between then and now, you stopped loving me?”

“No,” Ben whispered back.  “I do love you, Poe.  Still, and for always.”

Poe searched Ben’s face, from each eye down to his mouth; then he lowered his long lashes down over his own eyes and leaned up to touch his lips to Ben’s.  Ben drew in a shaky breath and returned Poe’s kiss gently, until the smaller man sat back again.  He looked up at Ben, now smiling his irresistible smile.

“And that’s why I could be nothing more than friends with Paige, or anyone else,” Poe said, “because after I lost you, I realized just how much you meant to me.  I realized I loved you then. . . and I love you now.”  He embraced Ben once more with his face hidden against the larger man’s shoulder.  His next words came out muffled, but Ben could understand them easily: “Still, and for always.”

\--

To be continued


	5. Chapter 5

When Llewyn laid his hand on Al’s arm, it marked the first time he had touched Al in years.  Al had been about to turn away, disheartened by Llewyn’s lack of response to Al’s attempts to express how much he’d missed their friendship.  But then he felt Llewyn grasp his arm and heard Llewyn saying that Al had played the piano beautifully.  Al looked down into Llewyn’s face and found Llewyn looking back with the expression of longing Ben claimed to have seen earlier.

 _Perhaps he really does want to talk,_ Al dared to hope.

“I don’t practice the piano as much as I should,” Al mumbled in response to Llewyn’s compliment, “but I enjoy it too much to give it up entirely.  And I’m glad you were exaggerating when you told Mother you didn’t sing much anymore.  You’re far too talented to quit, Llewyn.”

He could tell from the way Llewyn lowered his long lashes over his eyes, and the way his perfectly shaped lips twitched in a slight smile, that the praise pleased him, even though he immediately argued with it.

“I’m not that talented, Al,” he protested.  “But Father liked to hear it when we lived with him, and Poe does too sometimes, even though he pretends to complain.  And I do enjoy it.”  Llewyn glanced up again, then blinked. “Um, Al. . . where have Poe and Ben gone?”

“What?”  Al looked around and discovered that his and Llewyn’s brothers had disappeared.  “I. . . don’t know.  I think they’ve left the room, uh, to-together,” he finished in a stammer as a blush rose to his face.  Ben had seemed so reluctant to speak with Poe, and now they’d run off together!

 _And why should that embarrass me?_ Al chided himself.  _There’s nothing untoward about two old friends being alone together, and I should be happy they’re finally speaking again!  Just because I feel the way I do for Llewyn doesn’t mean Ben has those feelings for Poe. . . ._

“Hmph, finally.  Poe’s been trying to get Ben alone all night,” Llewyn muttered.

Al stared at him.  “Really?”

Llewyn nodded and said, “He wanted them to talk about—about things.”  He finished with a mumble, as if speaking of Ben and Poe’s troubles reminded him of his own with Al.  Llewyn turned away from Al and went back to studying the Christmas tree, although he had shown little interest earlier.  Al watched him and fidgeted.  He had wanted a moment alone with Llewyn himself—not that he had any hopes of convincing Llewyn to be his friend again, but Al had wanted to give him a gift for the holiday.

Al glanced about them a second time and made sure that no one was watching, yet before he could offer Llewyn his gift, the other man gestured to one of the ornaments on the tree.

“This one is yours, isn’t it?”  Llewyn was pointing at a delicate carving of a horse.  “You always did love horses.”

“Oh. . . yes, Father got it for me a few years ago,” Al answered.  “A contact of his sent it from America.  I do like it very much, although it makes me wish I could carve wood like that.  My hands are too large and clumsy to do any delicate work. . . just like the rest of me,” he finished with an awkward laugh.  Llewyn grimaced, and Al cursed himself for never knowing when to keep quiet.

Finally, Al decided he couldn’t make things any more awkward between Llewyn and himself, so he cleared his throat and touched the smaller man’s shoulder.

“Um, Llewyn?”

Llewyn looked up at him quickly.  “What?”

“Would—would you mind stepping out with me, just for a moment?” Al stammered.  “N-not to talk or anything serious, just. . . well, there’s something I want to show you.”  He felt his face growing warm again and cursed himself for sounding like an idiot.  Why couldn’t he be intelligent and good with words, like Ben was?  _Maybe then Llewyn would still like me,_ Al thought dismally.

Nevertheless, Llewyn was still looking up at him, still with that look in his eyes, and he nodded.  Al gulped; he hadn’t quite expected Llewyn to accept, and now he wasn’t sure how to proceed.  He ended up taking Llewyn’s elbow and guiding him out of the room.  The house was chilly beyond the heated parlor, and Al saw Llewyn shiver.  Llewyn had always been cold-natured, so Al hurried him to the only warm place he could think of, the kitchen.

The servants had finished cleaning up by then, so to Al’s relief, he and Llewyn had the room to themselves.  Llewyn sat down on the same rough wooden bench near the fireplace where he had sat so often as a child with Al to eat cookies or to share a slice of one of Leia’s pies.  It hurt Al to remember, and he wished too late that he’d taken Llewyn to any other room in the house.

“Well?” Llewyn muttered when Al hesitated to speak.  “What is it you wanted to show me in your kitchen?  Nothing’s changed as far as I can see. . . even after all these years.”  His voice dropped at the end, as if he too had suddenly remembered their shared past before that same fireplace.

Al told him, “It isn’t anything in this room, particularly.  I. . . I have a gift for you.  For Christmas.”  As he finally sat down beside Llewyn on the bench, but not too close, the smaller man turned to stare at him.

“A gift, for me?”  Llewyn frowned.  “I wasn’t expecting—I don’t have anything for you.”

“Oh, you aren’t supposed to!  It’s very small, hardly anything at all,” Al assured Llewyn.  He reached into his jacket and took out a little bundle he’d wrapped in waxed paper and tied with a piece of ribbon.  Al managed to stop his hand from shaking as he passed it to Llewyn.

Llewyn gave Al one more puzzled look, then untied the package to find the sticks of white candy Al had wrapped inside.  When Llewyn only held the opened bundle in his hands and gazed down at it without speaking, Al tried to explain.

“It’s peppermint candy, the kind you liked so much when we were young.  Father would always bring some home for Ben and me around Christmas, and you would always eat most of mine, so then Mother finally told Father just to bring an extra bundle so I could give you some for a Christmas gift—”  Al broke off his narration when Llewyn turned his whole body away from him.

Llewyn mumbled, “Thank you, Al,” yet he hardly sounded grateful.  In fact, his voice grated in his throat so that the words came out in a near growl.

“If you don’t like peppermint anymore, it’s all right, you don’t have to eat them,” offered Al.  “I just saw them in a shop when I was helping Mother buy the food for tonight’s dinner, and they reminded me of you, and how I used to be able to make you happy—Llewyn?”  He spoke Llewyn’s name with concern because Llewyn had interrupted him again, this time by making a strange, choking noise.  For a moment, Al thought Llewyn was about to be ill, especially when he bent over at the waist; perhaps something from dinner had disagreed with him.  Then the smaller man’s hunched shoulders trembled, he repeated the noise, and Al realized that Llewyn was sobbing.

“Llewyn!” Al shrieked in alarm.  “Llew, what is it, what’s wrong?”  He felt horrible that, for some unfathomable reason, his simple gift of candy had made Llewyn cry.  When Llewyn didn’t answer his question, Al slid closer to him and put an arm around his back.  Without realizing it, Al slipped into the old habit of using his pet name for Llewyn while trying to comfort him.

Al pled, “Llew, please don’t cry!  Whatever I did to upset you, I’m sorry!”  He hugged Llewyn against him and reached over with his free hand to stroke Llewyn’s curly hair.  Llewyn’s shoulders hitched, and he snuffled as he made a half-hearted attempt to pull away.  When Al didn’t immediately let him go, Llewyn gave in and slumped against him with his head on Al’s chest.  He still held the paper-wrapped peppermint sticks clutched in one hand.

Al wrapped both arms around the smaller man and rested his chin on the top of Llewyn’s head.  He held Llewyn until his weeping ceased and he only trembled faintly; then Al pulled out his own handkerchief and wiped Llewyn’s teary face with it.  That too was an old habit, for Llewyn had tended to lose his handkerchiefs as a child, and Al had forever been lending him his.  At the gesture, Llewyn very nearly began to cry all over again, but he managed to restrain himself to a sniffle.

“Now will you tell me what’s wrong?” Al asked him gently.  “If I did something to hurt you, please tell me so I can make it right.”

Llewyn make a frustrated sound then sighed, “Of course you didn’t do anything wrong, Al.  It’s just—I don’t—I don’t deserve this!”  He gestured with the bundle of peppermint sticks.

“Llewyn, it’s just candy—”

“That isn’t the _point_.  I don’t deserve any gift from you at all, or even to be here in your company. . . to have you be so kind to me.  I. . . .”  Llewyn trailed off and pressed his face into Al’s cravat so that his next words were muffled.  “Why don’t you hate me?  Why do you have to be so _nice_?”

“I couldn’t ever hate you, Llew,” Al insisted, “and anyway, you’re being silly!  Why shouldn’t you deserve a Christmas gift, or to be treated kindly?”

“You know why—”

Al shook his head and began to stroke his fingers through the longer curls of hair growing at the nape of Llewyn’s neck.  Now that he’d touched Llewyn for the first time in years, he found himself completely unable to let go.

“No, you’re wrong,” he murmured.  “Llewyn, that happened years ago, and you had every right to decide you didn’t want to be my friend anymore.”

“Al!”  Llewyn tilted his head back to look up into Al’s face.  Llewyn’s eyes and nose were red from crying, but to Al, he still looked precious and desirable.  Llewyn protested, “Al, I was horrible to you.  I didn’t really want to stop being your friend.  I never really wanted that.”

Al stared down at him as Llewyn’s words recalled all the painful details he’d tried to suppress of just _how_ Llewyn had ended their friendship.  How Al had written Llewyn faithfully, twice a week, while Al was away at school, even as Llewyn wrote back less and less frequently.  How Al and Ben had completed their schooling and finally returned home for good, and Al had gone out looking for Llewyn only to find him with a group of young men Al hardly knew.  How Al had overheard Llewyn talking to his new friends, saying hurtful things about _him_. . . the same things Ben had beaten up their schoolmates for saying about Al, things Al had never expected to hear from the person he loved more than anyone else in the world outside of his own family.

“Llewyn, if—if you didn’t want to be apart, then why did you. . . .”  To Al’s embarrassment, he felt like _he_ might start to cry.  He swallowed hard and tried again: “It’s not that I blame you.  Everything you said about me was true, and it’s still true—I’m clumsy, and my ears and nose and hands and feet are all too big, and I really _was_ too stupid to handle the business’s finances.  That’s why Father had to hire Hux to manage all of that.  But Llew. . . no one could care more about you than I do, and I tried to be a good friend to you.  So if those things bothered you about me, why didn’t you tell me?  Why did you make fun of me in front of _them_?”

“Al. . . .”  Llewyn reached up and touched Al’s cheek, then suddenly clenched his fingers into as much of Al’s short hair as he could grasp.  Llewyn’s face twisted into a look of mixed pain and loathing so intense, Al was certain Llewyn must absolutely hate him—until Llewyn spoke again, and Al realized Llewyn’s hatred was directed at himself.

“I didn’t know what I wanted,” Llewyn muttered.  “I missed you so much when you and Ben went away, and then after Ben and Poe had their fight your first Christmas home, I felt guilty getting your letters and writing to you, when Poe had no contact with Ben.  So I started trying to make other friends, but those boys. . . they teased me about how close you and I were and said that we must be—be sodomites.”

“Oh,” Al gulped.

Llewyn lowered his head and hissed, “I said and did whatever it took to prove them wrong, to make them accept me.  Including what you overheard.”  His voice choked up as he stammered, “I’m sorry, Al, I’m so sorry.  I thought they could give me more than you could—more excitement, more. . . I don’t know, _something_ , something I was missing.”

Al’s throat felt tight and painful with both suppressed tears and jealousy, but he managed to ask quietly, “Did you find it?  If they made you happier than I could, then I wouldn’t begrudge you that.”

“Of course they didn’t,” Llewyn mumbled, still with his face turned downwards, “and I never found what I was missing, not with them or later, with any of the women I chased or the jobs I couldn’t hold down.  If Father hadn’t packed me off to sea, I probably would have gotten myself killed one way or another.  Nearly got myself drowned as it was, but that would have been a better end than murdered by the jealous husband of some woman I never even cared for.”  He laughed mirthlessly, but Al gasped and drew Llewyn closer to him.

“You almost drowned?  Llew, I didn’t know—what happened?”  When Llewyn still wouldn’t look at him, Al cupped the smaller man’s chin in his hand and tilted it up until he could see Llewyn’s eyes.  Llewyn sighed and, at the same time, gave Al a faint smile.

“It doesn’t matter now—just more of my carelessness.  But it taught me that a rough sea is far less forgiving than even my father, and after that, I vowed to do better.  I guess that’s what Father wanted for me all along when he sent me away, but anyhow, I ended up becoming a damn good sailor considering what I started as.”  Llewyn’s smile grew a little warmer, and he met Al’s eyes again.  “You should see the muscles I have now.  I’m not scrawny anymore, like I used to be.”

“I-I’ve noticed,” Al mumbled, “when I’ve seen you working on the docks.  Your arms, they’re. . . impressive.”

Llewyn flushed slightly.  “I’ve tried to do better here too.  I know I’ve only been home a month, but I’ve stayed out of trouble.  No—no affairs, and I’ve worked hard.  I didn’t want to cause your father problems after he was kind enough to give me a job.”  He hesitated, bit his lip, then asked, “You asked him to do that, didn’t you?”

Now Al was the one to hesitate, but ultimately he nodded and admitted, “Yes, I did.  I thought you might have difficulty finding work elsewhere.  And. . . .”  Al drew a shaky breath then forced himself to voice his feelings.  “And I wanted to keep you close to me.  You’d been away for so long, and we had been apart for so long before that.  With you working for Father, I knew I could at least see you sometimes.  That’s really why I come down to the docks so often—whenever someone from the office has to run an errand there, I offer to do it.  Even though you never speak to me, it makes me happy just to see you and know that you’re all right.”

“Al. . . .”  Llewyn’s dark eyes filled with tears again as they searched Al’s.  “I watch for you every day, and when I see you, it’s the best part of my day.”

“Then why—why won’t you speak to me?  You never even look at me, Llew!” Al cried.

“Because I can’t forgive myself for what I did to you,” Llewyn told him.  “I’m trying to become someone good, someone more like you, but I’ll never deserve to be with you.”

Al had had enough of Llewyn’s conviction that he didn’t “deserve” Al’s affection, especially now that he realized Llewyn really did still care about him.  He cupped Llewyn’s cheek in one hand and demanded, “So to make up for hurting me years ago, you’re going to keep on hurting me for years to come?”

Llewyn protested, “No, that’s not what I meant—”

“But it’s what you’re doing,” Al insisted gently.  “Llewyn, I forgive you.  I forgave you a long time ago.  Now please, forgive yourself so we can be friends again.  Whatever it is you’re missing in your life, I can help you find it, if you’ll only let me.”

Llewyn blinked, hard, and one of the tears in his eyes slid down his cheek.

“I know what it is.  It’s _you_ ,” he whispered.  “I knew it when I was out there on the ocean and I realized I might never see you again.  I knew then that I needed you, _more_ of you, not less.  But I was sure I’d pushed you away forever.”

Al shook his head.  “I’m as stubborn as the rest of my family, just a little quieter about it.  Llew, you—you hurt me, you _did_ , but I’ve never stopped caring for you.  I’ve never stopped needing you, or waiting here for you, just in case you ever decided you wanted me back.”

“I do,” Llewyn whispered, so faintly and shakily Al could hardly hear him.

Al nodded and fumbled around between them until he found the bundle of peppermint sticks he’d given Llewyn.  Pulling one out, he broke it in two then held one half up to Llewyn’s lips.

“Open,” he ordered.  Llewyn gave him a look that was part bewildered and part amused, but then he licked his lips and obeyed.  Al stuck the half stick of candy in Llewyn’s mouth and put the other in his own.

“There,” mumbled Al around the candy.  “Now we’re friends again.  You can’t share a peppermint stick with someone and not be his friend.”

Llewyn gave a weak laugh and demanded to know, “Oh, and who made that rule?”

“I did, so you can’t question it,” declared Al.  Llewyn laughed again and leaned against Al’s shoulder as he sucked on his peppermint.

“I think I like this assertive side of you,” Llewyn observed.  “You really could run the business yourself if you acted like this more often.  And Al. . . you _aren’t_ stupid.  None of those things I said back then was true.”

“My nose and ears really _are_ big,” Al pointed out, trying to keep Llewyn from drifting too far back into his self-recrimination.

“Well, yes, but you’ve grown into them.”  Llewyn chewed up and swallowed the last of his candy, then shifted to look up at Al as he clarified, “I mean that you’ve become very handsome, Al.  When I came home last month, after being gone for two years, I could hardly believe how mature you looked.”

Al couldn’t keep from smiling as he asked, “You truly think so?”

“Of course,” said Llewyn.  He touched Al’s face again, just to the side of his mouth.  “And what I thought of most while I was away, when I missed you, was this. . . your smile.  I’m so glad to see it again.”

“You can’t mean _that_.  My smile is so silly, because my mouth’s too big!” protested Al.

Llewyn chuckled, “It is _not!_   Your mouth is beautiful, Al.”

Al looked down at Llewyn’s own smile and murmured, “Not as beautiful as yours.  I always thought the women you saw were very fortunate, getting to kiss your perfect lips.”  Llewyn’s eyes widened, and for a second, Al thought he’d said more than he should.

But then Llewyn dropped his eyelashes down even lower than usual and murmured, “No, they weren’t so fortunate.  Perhaps they got kisses from my lips, but they never had my heart.”  He slid his hand to the back of Al’s head and coaxed him forward.  When their mouths were nearly touching, Llewyn added in a whisper, “I guess that’s always belonged to you.”

Al pulled Llewyn to him in a tight embrace and kissed him hard—harder even than Llewyn was expecting, judging from the startled sound Llewyn made.  But Al wanted it known in no uncertain terms that he was claiming Llewyn as his from now on, and Llewyn _had_ said he liked Al’s assertiveness, after all.  Llewyn tasted like peppermint from the candy he’d eaten, which made kissing him all the more enjoyable.  Once he had recovered from his surprise, he returned Al’s kisses with equal vigor.  By the time their mouths broke apart, Llewyn had scrambled almost into Al’s lap, and they both were gasping for breath.

“Llew!” Al panted before caressing a curl of hair that had fallen over Llewyn’s temple, then a particularly kissable-looking spot on his neck.  Llewyn groaned happily and tilted his head to the side to invite more kisses there, but Al managed to restrain himself.  Llewyn tightened his arms around Al’s shoulders and laid his head against one of them.

“Al,” he murmured, “I love you.”

“I love you too, Llewyn,” Al whispered back.  He rested his cheek against Llewyn’s soft hair, then asked, “Um, Llewyn?  You said that when those boys called us that—that word, it bothered you.  But doesn’t this mean that we. . . we _are_?”

Llewyn laughed gently and nuzzled Al’s neck before telling him, “It bothered me then, because they made me believe I was wrong to feel what I did for you.  And then I spent years denying what I felt.  But now—now I don’t care what it makes me, or what anyone else would call us if they knew.  I love you, Al, and for the first time since we were young, I’m truly _happy_.  No one can take that, or you, away from me now.”

Relaxing, Al hugged Llewyn close.  “I’m happy too, Llew, and I’m never letting you go again.”

\--

To be continued


	6. Chapter 6

Perhaps understandably, Ben lost track of how long he spent in the library with Poe, and by the time they slipped back into the parlor, the party was nearing its end.  A few of the guests had already departed for their homes, but most were still there, enjoying the hot punch Leia had served.

“That sounds like a good idea,” commented Poe, who kept close to Ben’s side with a secretive, and rather smug, smile on his handsome face as they made their way toward the punch bowl.  “I got cold in the library, once the stove cooled down.”

“How could you get cold with me right there to keep you warm?” Ben teased him.  Nevertheless, he cheerfully prepared a cup of punch for Poe before serving himself.  He wished he could take Poe back into his arms right there in the parlor, especially when he realized that Poe and Llewyn would soon have to say good night and leave for home.  Ben hated to think of being separated from Poe right after their reconciliation, even though he knew they could see one another almost every day.

 _Every day isn’t enough,_ Ben thought as he watched Poe sip his punch with the perfect lips Ben had so recently kissed.  _I want to be with him every night too._   Poe noticed Ben watching him and smiled, again with the secretive and faintly smug expression.  Ben flushed and turned his attention to the rest of the room, trying to distract himself by looking his and Poe’s brothers.  Ben finally spotted them standing together near the piano.  Al leaned down for Llewyn to murmur something in his ear, and judging from the wide smile that broke out on Al’s face, it was something he liked.

Poe followed Ben’s gaze and commented, “I wonder what they talked about while we were out of the room.  Llewyn looks happier than I’ve ever seen him since he came home last month.”

Before Ben could respond, Hux stalked over to him and grumbled, “Where did you disappear to?  I should have left half an hour ago—you know how Father dislikes for me to stay out late, and I have to see Phasma home before I can go home myself.”

“I should think Phasma would be the one to see _you_ home,” observed Ben with a glance across the room at Phasma, who was again spurning the advances of her admirer from Blind Man’s Bluff.  From the little smirk she wore as she did so, Ben judged that she rather enjoyed it.  Hux scowled.

“In any case, I shall bid you good night,” he sniffed; then he nodded to Poe.  “And good night to you as well, Mr. Dameron.”

“Good night, and merry Christmas,” Poe said cheerfully.  He still stood close to Ben’s side, and Hux gave them both a curious, and vaguely suspicious, look before he left them and went to collect Phasma.  Poe chuckled and tugged on Ben’s sleeve to direct him toward their brothers.

Al beamed his wide grin once more when Ben and Poe approached them.  Llewyn wasn’t exactly smiling, but he was pressed even closer to Al than Poe was to Ben.

“Is everything all right?” Al asked Ben, although his smile said he already knew the answer.

“Um, yes, everything is fine,” Ben mumbled.

“Very fine,” added Poe.  Llewyn smirked.

Al nodded.  “That’s, that’s good.  Uh, Llewyn and I were talking, and I thought—well, it’s getting awfully late, and it’s so cold out.  I thought that maybe Llewyn and Poe could spend the night here tonight, like they used to do.”

Poe and Llewyn had frequently slept over at Ben and Al’s home when the boys were children.  However, the situation had been quite different then, when all four were much smaller: Ben and Poe could easily fit into Ben’s single bed, while Al and Llewyn slept together in Al’s.  Now, Ben wasn’t so sure they could share.  Nevertheless, Al had a point—it _was_ late, and the night _was_ cold, and hadn’t Ben himself just been regretting that he would soon have to bid Poe good night?

Ben turned to Poe and asked, “Would you like to stay for the night, if Llewyn agrees?”

“Of course I agree,” Llewyn interrupted in a grumble.  “It’s bloody cold out there, and I don’t want to walk home in it.”

Poe gave Llewyn a stern glance then told Ben, “It’s kind of you to offer, and we’d like to stay.”  He paused, licked his lips, and said in a low voice that made Ben’s knees feel weak, “I’d _love_ to stay.  But wouldn’t it inconvenience your parents?  I know your mother has gone to a lot of trouble just to arrange this party, and she may not want to host us overnight as well.”  Ben chuckled and put his hand on Poe’s shoulder to give it a squeeze since he couldn’t hug Poe himself.

“You know how Mother feels about you two,” Ben said.  “Just this afternoon, she was telling Al and me about how she wanted to give you a nice Christmas.  She’ll be delighted to have you stay.  And so will I.”

Poe smiled at him, a bit shyly, and said, “All right, we’ll stay then.”

Soon Leia put Al to work at the piano again—not without a significant look at the company he and Ben were keeping—playing “We Wish You a Merry Christmas” so everyone could sing one last song before the guests departed.  Now Al seemed much happier at the piano than he had earlier, and Llewyn’s eyes were bright instead of wistful as he stood beside Al and watched him play.  Normally, Ben didn’t enjoy singing, but even he felt like joining in this time.

After the song, the guests began to trickle out into the night.  Han’s hunting companions left in a herd, and once they had gone, Han himself vanished into another part of the house, leaving his wife to bid the other guests farewell.  Ben and Al joined Leia at the front door to fill in for their absent father, although she muttered with a rueful sigh that by now, she ought not to expect Han to exhibit any social graces.

When the last guests save for the Damerons were gone, Leia turned back toward the parlor, but Ben stopped her by clearing his throat.  She looked over at him and raised her eyebrows.

“Yes, Ben?”

Ben mumbled, “Uh, Al and I were wondering if—if Poe and Llewyn might stay overnight.  They came here on foot, and it’s so late now, and it’s begun to snow.”

“Of course they may stay.  I’ll have Threepio go start a fire in the guest bedroom,” Leia replied.  “Although I must say, you’ve certainly had a change of heart toward Poe and Llewyn since this afternoon.  May I ask what caused it?”

Ben swallowed and glanced at Al, then back at his mother.  Finally, he said, “Poe and I. . . talked.”

“Llewyn and I did too,” Al volunteered.  When neither of her sons offered any more information than that, Leia just smiled and shook her head.

“All right, then I’m glad you had your talk,” she told them both.  “Go tell Poe and Llewyn they may stay, and take them up to your room until we have the guest room ready for them.”

Ben just nodded, but Al said, “Thank you, Mother,” and bent down to kiss her cheek, which only embarrassed Ben more.  He hurried back to the parlor to collect Poe, who had taken it upon himself to help the servants gather up the guests’ discarded punch cups.

“Mother said you can stay,” Ben murmured to him.  He took the cups out of Poe’s hands and deposited them with a clatter on the tray Threepio was carrying.

“Well, I never!” Threepio muttered.

“And she wants _you_ to go start the fire in the guest room,” Ben added with a pointed look at the servant.

“Yes, I do,” said Leia as she entered the room behind Al.  “You may leave the tidying up for tomorrow.  You and Artie both have worked so hard today, the parlor can wait.  Artie, just put out the candles on the tree, please?  Threepio and I will see to the guest room.”

“ _He_ can’t put out all the candles, he’s much too short,” Threepio sniffed.

When his counterpart muttered, “I’ll stand on a chair,” Threepio looked as if he’d been slapped.

“And get dirty footprints all over the furniture?  You’ll do nothing of the sort!” he fumed.  “Master Ben and Master Al can blow out the candles.”

Al chuckled and agreed, “Yes, we can manage the candles.  The rest of you, just go!”

Once the Christmas tree was finally extinguished, Ben and Al took Poe and Llewyn up to the bedroom they shared.  The Damerons had not seen that room in years, and Poe smiled when he looked at the single bed he and Ben had slept in when he spent the night as a child.

“I suppose it’s best that Llewyn and I do stay in the guest room,” murmured Poe.  “I don’t know that all four of us could tolerate one another in this small space for an entire night.”

Llewyn rolled his eyes and said, “Really, Poe?  You want to share a bed with _me_ tonight?”

Both Poe and Al blushed at the same time, and Al stammered, “B-but Mother expects you to sleep in the. . . .”  He trailed off when Llewyn looked up at him from under a curtain of dark eyelashes.

“Since Poe’s the one who thinks this space is so small, he can still sleep in the guest room,” Llewyn told him.  “With Ben.  _I_ believe you and I can fit in your bed, just like we used to.  We just might have to sleep a little closer together, that’s all.  You won’t mind, will you, Al?”

Al’s cheeks darkened from pink to crimson, but he shook his head “no” all the same.

Ben and Al found nightshirts for Poe and Llewyn to borrow just before Leia knocked on their door to tell them the guest room was ready for them.  She smiled at her two houseguests, then at her sons—and she could not have failed to notice the awkward way all four of them smiled back—and bid them good night.

“Sleep well, my dears,” she told them as she withdrew, “and I’ll see you all at breakfast tomorrow.”

Poe and Llewyn went to the guest room to get ready for bed while Ben and Al got undressed in their own room, just in case Leia should check up on them.  After a few moments, Llewyn slipped back into the bedroom.  He had washed up and was all but engulfed by one of Al’s nightshirts.  When Ben gave a muffled snicker, Llewyn glared at him and commented that Poe looked just as ridiculous.

Ben left Llewyn and Al on their own so he could go see Poe for himself.  After checking the upstairs hallway to be sure his mother really had gone, Ben crept down the hall and tapped softly on the guest room door.  When he heard Poe call “Come in?” in an equally soft voice, Ben’s heart beat faster.  He went in and closed the door behind him, then turned to look at Poe, who was sitting on the edge of the large bed.  His feet didn’t even touch the floor, and he swung them back and forth nervously.  Like Llewyn, Poe was nearly swallowed up by Ben’s nightshirt, but Ben thought he looked desirable rather than ridiculous.

Ben went over to Poe and put both hands on the smaller man’s shoulders.  Now, instead of having to limit himself to that, he could progress to pulling Poe into his arms and holding Poe close to him.  Poe came willingly and nestled himself against Ben’s chest with his own arms wrapped tightly around Ben’s shoulders.

“Ben,” he murmured, “I’m so happy.  I’m so glad you asked us to stay.”

After Ben put out the lantern, he got into bed with Poe and covered them both up.  Even with the fire crackling in the fireplace, the room still felt chilly, so Ben pulled Poe back into his arms again right away.  Poe curled up against him, and the heat of his small body warmed Ben all the way through.  Ben trailed his fingers through Poe’s hair and bent his head to kiss his friend’s forehead.

“I love you, Poe,” he whispered.  “I’m sorry I kept us apart for so long, because we’re meant to be like this—together.”

Poe murmured back, “I love you too, Ben.  You’re right, we _are_ meant to be together, and we _will_ be together from now on.”  He tilted his head back to catch Ben’s mouth in a kiss which, although gentle at first, soon deepened into desperate passion.  Poe’s hands gripped Ben’s shoulders then moved down his back, and Ben’s shifted to clutch Poe’s hips through his nightshirt.

“Mmmn, Ben,” Poe moaned into Ben’s mouth, “we—we aren’t going to get much sleep this way.”

Ben stopped kissing and drew his head back, so that Poe whined and tried to pursue his mouth.  Ben laughed and teased him, “Why, are you tired?  Do you want me to let you go to sleep?”

Poe pinned Ben down on his back with a hand on each shoulder and declared, “I had all those years alone to sleep at night.  I’d like to think that I’m plenty well-rested by now.”  Then he resumed kissing Ben right where he had left off.

\--

As soon as Ben left his and Al’s bedroom, Llewyn closed the door and practically threw himself at Al.  Al caught Llewyn in his arms and pulled him close.

“You’re absolutely wicked,” he mumbled into Llewyn’s hair as they embraced, “making our brothers share a bed just so you can share mine.”

“You didn’t put much effort into protesting,” Llewyn pointed out.  He pulled Al over to the bed in question and sank down on it, tugging Al down after him.  “Al, we’ve been apart for so long—don’t make me spend another night without you.”

Of course Al could not argue with that.  He managed to arrange his lanky body in bed so that there was still enough room for Llewyn to huddle beside him, as long as Al kept his arms and legs wrapped around the other man’s smaller body.  Llewyn did not seem to mind this in the least.  In fact, he pressed as close to Al as he could and proceeded to cover Al’s neck with kisses.  At first, Al worried that Llewyn would leave bruises, but soon he had ceased to care.

Some time later, Llewyn had finally exhausted himself, and he fell asleep still wrapped in Al’s arms with his head on his lover’s chest.  After such an emotional day, Al too felt sleep close at hand, but he managed to stay awake a little longer; he wanted to enjoy holding Llewyn after years of longing for the friend he thought he’d lost.  He pressed a kiss to the top of Llewyn’s head then laid his cheek against it.

“I love you,” Al whispered to the sleeping man.  “And I’ll always love you, Llew.  I’ll love you forever.”

\--

The End


End file.
